the work...

i'm trying my hardest to be a freight train... the way i was in school... always with my head and hands stuck in the paint... always thinking about what painting IS, what it DOES, what it MEANS, and what it's capable of...

this work has me all twisted up- a sign i'm on fertile ground. i've got 3 more canvasses going (if you count the problem child of the bunch) and i'm anxious to start a fourth. i don't want to get away from this image any time soon. i need to follow this one. it's a good teacher. it's generous and demanding. and the 10 hour painting day has helped me relearn a great many things. there's no substitute for crawling in the dirt, getting stuck in the mud, and learning how to deal with mistakes and presumptions and falsehoods. i'm in a place where there is no excuse for laziness or complacency- everything counts. everything. and i really feel like i'm getting back to the place i was upon graduation- a place where i know how to live with the work... a place where i'm alright... a place where wrestling and yelling is expected and acceptable and prized even... a place where intention is important and necessary... a place where intention is king. it's a land whose terrain i know i'm able to climb and all the scrapes and bruises are just part of the exploration.

the maids have become as important to me as the Anonymous Girl series. they are just as beloved. they are just as eager to get out in to the world. and it's to their credit that they aren't for everyone. i know there is a sinister quality in these canvasses and that's exactly what makes them intriguing, smart, heartfelt, and important. i know they're a bit odd-ball, a bit macabre, a bit uncomfortable... i know that, in some ways, they're challenging... but that's what makes them interesting. that's what gives them a real, hard, true voice.

they stand.